Oops, HOUSE FLOOD!! Audiophile vinyl collection got soaked. Where do we go from here?

So I'm not alone, sorry to hear that.

You're right, I'll take a big hit in divesting.  I fortunately have maintained a vastly detailed collection spreadsheet along with partial pics dating back to the late-70s through early-80s when mostly collected, and invited our homeowners insurance company to take a look while drying still was in process, so will be coming away with at least some amount of insurance settlement.  Coupled with the several thou (who knows?) I expect to get when listing here the remaining mix of roughly 180 pristine never-played-and-once-played-to-tape vinyl in not-pristine-but-presentable covers, overall loss shouldn't be totally terrible.

Appreciate your comments on making sure drying is complete.  The cardboard itself was stuffed with paper toweling to hold open for professional restoration company drying fans to do their job (they were here anyway for drying other portions of the house, so re-aimed to blow over the albums the final four days).  The background drone of fan noise took some getting used to, but they did the job.  One unforeseen result was that many of the covers retained a misshapen open condition after the toweling was removed, but four more days' flattening  under 2' x 2' boards topped with considerable weight mostly resolved that, so as said above, ended up being not-pristine-but-presentable.  Overall we were pretty lucky, dealt with the damage quickly, vinyl was untouched, and covers got back to reasonable respectability.  Some other collector overall also will be pretty lucky on divestiture pricing.  I'll take the hit, but cushioned by the partial insurance recovery, so definitely softens the blow.

All-

my condolences to anyone whom lost his collection to the hazards of Mother Nature.  I barely escaped Hurricane Katrina w/ mine.

Concur w/ the panel- eBay will reach your largest audience with a "lot" sale.
Let the consumer offer you a price.  Audiogon would be a good 2nd option.

God Speed

Stanr ...

Sorry to hear about your loss ... 

I have thousands of LP's that I've collected over the years. I have many mint condition albums ... but I have albums that have really good covers, even mint covers with vinyl that's pretty noisy. I'd be happy to buy a bargain priced LP with a damaged cover in order to get the mint LP that resides inside of that cover.

I'll bet there's a lot of serious collectors out there who would buy some of your albums off of Ebay. Just tell it like it is: "Cover damaged in flood - record is mint." 

OP

Sorry about your loss.
My lps were ruined in a house flood on August 6, 1985.  I remember the date because my wife had a C section that day.  I was in Grad school, broke, couldn't replace any of them.  There were no second hand stores selling lps then, and worse, no streaming services.  When I finally had a little cash to spend the stores were stocking CDs and my tt was effectively worthless.  I held onto he moldy, smelly lps for a few years but they were unplayable and the wet cardboard stank when it dried.
  You have to keep in mind that what matters is the Music,not the playback medium.  With a streaming service, you can have unlimited access to titles for between $10-$20/ month.  Meanwhile with the current interest in vinyl means that lps, new and old, are available in multiple outlets, so you can start collecting again while still being able to have easy access to your music.
  I would toss the rotting, germ filled slabs of petroleum.  Take it from one who has been there

Insurance paid up when I had a loss. Fortunately my insurance agent had explained the need for cataloging so at his suggestion I allowed him to hire a student ,of his choice, to create an alphabetical list (I paid of course) with details. I only lost a few, to a city caused sewer back up; but one was a 'very' early and rare Elvis Presley. Due to the independent documentation I was properly compensated. Prior documentation is essential for insurance. Perhaps a good summer student opportunity for those of you with valuable collections and gear.